Comment by whoknowsidont | Hacker News Reader

Comment by whoknowsidont | Hacker News Reader

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Augustus IS Julius Caesar, he quite literally inherited the name (and all of his great uncle's property).

The full quote is this:

>During the late Roman Empire, rulers like Julius Caesar and Nero owned homes in the town, which was known as a destination that aristocrats flocked to for drinking, parties and general hedonism.

Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus (aka Octavian) not only gained his great uncle's original property, but he invested quite heavily into property and other public works in Baiae with other emperors doing the same. Baiae was very much an "imperial city" and it definitely kicked off with Octavian.

The city gained much of its notoriety (or negative connotation for extravagance) as time went on.

And the sentence says "like", as in "hey reader, here are these two pretty familiar names who are not only relevant to the city itself, but also can give you an idea of the type of elite class we're talking about." It's a pretty succinct way of putting it and while reinforcing multiple points at once.

So it's not wrong. If you're going to be pedantic, at least be correct.

Well, no. "Julius Caesar" with no other qualifier is Julius Caesar, even if other rulers also used the name. Otherwise it would be difficult to differentiate them.

Well yes, that's quite literally how it worked. When Octavian was adopted he literally became Gaius Julius Caesar and technically lost the "Octavianus" part of his former name; roman names did not work like our modern day names.

The article is well constructed for its intended audience without getting into largely irrelevant details about the story.

It's accurate and purposeful. It's certainly not incorrect by any measure.

That's how it worked then (for Romans), but it's not how it works now. So when the writer refers to Julius Caesar without any other qualifications, he refers to the adoptive father of Octavian. It's a minor nitpick though, hardly worth bringing up, but it is correct.

edit: as someone else observed, none of these were part of the late Roman Empire. Octavian and Nero lived in the early Roman Empire, and Caesar lived during the last years of the Republic.

>That's how it worked then (for Romans), but it's not how it works now.

Unfortunately you don't get to flip a switch arbitrarily and choose when to be pedantic to make an irrelevant point.

>The article is well constructed for its intended audience without getting into largely irrelevant details about the story.

Nero isn't from the the late Roman Empire either.

And you're reading a popsci article by a freelance journalist. Stick to the actual important topic instead of going "akschually" _WHILE_ being incorrect.

Exactly, and Augustus was the first Roman emperor!

That's about as accurate as saying that John Adams and John Quincy Adams were the same person rather than father and son.

They didn't have roman names.

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